Waiting For Death
by Cion Lash
Summary: Child in a broken home; beaten, battered, humiliated. How will this shape the boy? How will he learn to cope with everything around him, to connect with other people and become a man?
1. Chapter 1

Prologue

_Knife_

_Punctures_

_Your lungs_

_Now you can't breath._

My name is Shane; at least that's what I call my self. That name was given to me by my father, he loved old westerns so much that he named me after his favorite, however my "mother" decided my name should be Anthony and so on my birth certificate my name reads as follow: Anthony Shane Richard. But you will know me as Angier Hawkings. The Details and events you are about to read about are of my childhood and my experiences growing up without a family.

I'm not going to tell you how hard it was for me to live or how difficult it was to find my place; I'll let you make your own distinctions about that. What I want is to leave behind some kind of record that my pathetic life existed. I will always remember what happen to me no matter how hard I try to forget, and I'm going to make sure the people responsible never forget either. I will probably seem like a deranged lunatic by the end of this story, but I hope you can keep an open mind. But when my story is concluded...

It will finally be within reach... The goal of my desire. All that's left to do is raise my hand and pull the trigger... Then and only then will it finally end.. All my pain, my humiliation, all the suffering I've gone through...

It ends here, or maybe this is just the beginning...

Act I

Chapter 1

Age: 5 years old

_Ache_

_Heart stops_

_You drop_

_Your on your knees now._

I woke up slowly. There's loud noises' coming from another room, what is it? I'm still to far asleep to understand what's going on. It's piercing and hoarse, but it's two different sounds. Then I realized what was going on, my parents were fighting again. I roll over to look at my alarm clock, it was 2 A.M. I couldn't make out what they were saying, it sounded like it was about me, but I wished they would have stop. Back and forth they went, I heard slapping and thud sounds and I already know what's going on. My "mother" is hitting my father again; she was always like this...

My father's damned pride kept him from fighting back. He always said that he'll never hit a woman, which my mother took advantage of with ease... Why did my father marry this woman? All she did was scream and hit him... At least it's wasn't me on this night... I looked down at my broken wrist as tears welled up from the memory. I heard a door slam and I knew it was over, my mother had recited into her room and my dad was left to sleep on the sofa. I was to get up early in the morning to see my doctor, checking up on how my wrist was healing. Luckily for me my father will take me. I don't know what I would have done without him... At least at this point.

I wish though I could have told him the truth. When he asked me about my wrist, I was too scared to tell him the truth... Scared because my mother was in the emergency room with me. I told him I was playing with some kids from the down stairs apartment, and I happened to slip on cardboard we were playing with and landed on my wrist. He didn't seem to believe me at first then my mother intruded, saying she had been watching me when it happened and that I was too careless. The doctor came back with the X-ray; my wrist had popped out of place and had a small fracture.

The truth was my mom was yelling at me because I got play-dough on the living room carpet. I wouldn't look at her, this pissed her off, and I thought I saw her hand rise as she was telling me to look at her. I started to run for my room because I thought she was going to hit me again... I wanted to crawl under my bed, I had a bunk bed and she couldn't move it by herself very well, I could escape from her there.. But I was too slow. She caught me by my left arm and started screaming, "YOU THINK YOU'RE GONNA RUN FROM ME?" I tried to jerk my arm from her grip but to no avail. And the next thing I saw was the wall closing in fast, she had my left arm, I raised my right arm to protect my face and that's when it happened.

I had never felt anything so painful; I didn't think anything could be this painful! I laid on the ground withering in pain I couldn't stop crying and screaming. This only made my "mother" angrier. She was screaming at me to shut up, telling me she would really give me something to cry about if I didn't stop. All I could do was tell her how much it hurt and that it felt like it was broken. This made her realize what happened and stopped.

She screwed up, she left proof. I remember her spitting on me and cursing as she walked off down the hall. I still couldn't stop crying, it hurt so bad, looking at it sent me into shock I tried to move my fingers but they wouldn't move, it looked twisted. It was too much to take in. I couldn't help it I vomited there on the floor.

I heard my mother getting her keys; she walks over to me and stops. She's seething now, pissed of unbelievably that I puked on the floor. She start's screaming more and kicked me in the side. She grabs my left hand and drags me up and starts pulling me towards the door. She's still pulling me down the stairs and it takes all the energy I have to keep up and not fall down. We're finally in the car and she's sitting there. The pain is still too much I can't stop crying. Finally she talks in a low and it sounded like a strained soft voice.

"I didn't mean to hurt you Anthony. You need to learn to obey your mother. If you hadn't of ran this wouldn't have happened. Remember I love you."

She's stroking my hair and I could do nothing but look away from her disgusted. I couldn't stop shivering and crying, I couldn't believe that her apology was blaming me for what happened. I hated her so much!

"Now look, you let me do all the talking understand me? I will tell the Doctor what happened and you **will** **not** correct me or tell him different understood? If anyone else knew the truth, you would be in very big trouble. If you tell anyone especially your father, you will be sent to a foster home and you will never see you father, his family, your brother, or me ever again. Understood?"

All I could do was nod shakingly, I didn't have any energy to talk, and there was just too much pain.

We're finally in the emergency room and the doctor is asking questions while looking at my wrist. My mother speaks for me telling him that I'm too shocked and exhausted to speak, saying she witnessed the whole thing, this doesn't phase the Doctor as he just keeps asking away while moving my wrist lightly, causing me to seethe in pain. We're finally in the X-ray room and its taking so long for him to take the damn thing. My dad arrives after we finish in the X-ray room and we're sitting in the waiting room and I tell him the same story that woman gave the doctor.

That was almost a month before hand. After that occurred my mother didn't touch me for a long time, too afraid of leaving more evidence. Or maybe it's because my dad put a request in at work to change his schedule around to be home around me more. He probably suspected what actually happened and didn't want it to get worse. I wanted to scream it out to him what happened but I couldn't... "Why can't I? Why..." Those words repeated over and over and over in my head, till I cried my self to sleep.

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I don't remember much more after that, it's all very hazy. Shortly after this incident, my father and "mother" get a divorce... And after the custody hearing I am sent to live with my "mother"...

This is when hell begins...


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter II

Age: 6 years old

_Grieve_

_'cause on_

_this night_

_you will remember._

Things had gotten better for me, my "mother" is planning to move to some small town in Oklahoma, and until she found a house, I was sent to live with my grandparents in the same town, while my mother stayed behind for whatever reason. I don't really care why, I'm just glad I'm not with her. Living in this town wasn't bad I missed my friend from back home though. But living with my "mother" I certainly did not miss. Everything was going great, I was having fun in Sunday school, and my grandparents were the sweetest people I had ever met next to my dad.

But on that note, not everything was great... After the custody hearing, I never saw my father again... I don't know why at this point, I've gotten a birthday card or two from him, but when my mom found them they were ripped up and thrown away... It took a long time to collect myself after loosing my dad. Being with my grandparents helped me a lot. We played card games, board games, even got to play Dr. Mario with my grandpa on his old NES, it was the only game that worked besides Tetris, but that didn't bother me; I was with family that loved me. I started making some friends from their church, everything was going great.

And then, my "mother" found a house... She was coming back... And I had to live with her... A couple weeks after we move into our new house, things are not instantly worse but stress and tension is building up in my "mother" from the move. I remember going through some of my stuff that was moved from the apartment and I finally found my most precious item. A stuffed bear that was dressed as a train conductor, my dad gave this to me after my wrist was put in a cast.

It was the only thing I had left from him; I treasured it with all my heart. However the box the bear was in happened to be in her room, she had a lot of my old stuff mixed in with hers, she caught me getting my bear out and was yelling at me asking why I was snooping around in her stuff, I don't remember answering her, just getting a slap across the cheek. By this age I learned not to cry in front of her... Crying made it worse.

But I got a break, my brother and my aunt were going to live with us in the house and the moved in soon after. My "mother" really never did anything to me when they were around, luckily with going to kindergarten and my brother and aunt at the house, I never really had to be alone with her, at least for very long.

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But "mother" wasn't the only person I would learn to avoid.

My brother... Word's can't describe him, I can't fully understand if he hates me or just see's me as a nuisance... The earliest memory I have of him was when I was three years old, he stuffed me in a dryer and turn it on for 2 spins. I fell onto my head each spin. I often have visual memory and short term memory problems which I think it is because of this incident, I can't remember people's faces well without looking at a photograph and it's hard to remember any of my dreams, but my family doesn't think it's true. My "mother" didn't find out about the incident until a year later, and nothing happened to him after she was informed. Instead I was told I shouldn't have instigated him by fighting with him. But I digress. Brother wasn't as vicious as my "mother" was by the time he moved in.

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I am almost seven, and school is almost over, it's been very hard living here with my "mother", I've only made one friend, who lives down the street, but he's not allowed over at my house. Instead I have to go to his house so me and him can play. Brother was the one who told him he wasn't welcomed; he tries to make my life hell it seems. We're not even full brothers, we have different dads. He often kicks me out of our room, I'm forced to share with him, so he can have his "space".

One night he kicks me out so he can be with his girlfriend or whatever. "Mother" has grounded me for not picking my toys up in the living room so I can't watch T.V. with her, so I just curl up into a corner across from my bedroom door and wait until I can sleep in my room. It seemed like an hour had gone by and I slowly get up, I'm tired of the cold floor I just want to go to bed. I walk in and head for my bed when I hear my brother yell at me, he grabs his pants and shoves them on as he strides towards me.

He grabs me by the collar and tries to pull me out the door, I struggled yelling at him that I wanted to go to sleep, he lets go of me with a shove as I stand in the door way holding on to the sides as I call him and asshole, he kicks me with his foot to get me to let go and I fall easily to the floor. He tells me to stay out of his room and closes the door. My door is in direct eye site from the living room couch where my "mother" is watching T.V. She doesn't say a word.

I rose up slowly struggling to breathe, as I made my way to the back bedroom, well it was really a room just to store all the unsorted crap from the move, we have an extra couch in here. I grabbed one of the blankets draped on the couch and laid down trying to push any thought from my mind so I can finally go to sleep. It takes 2 hours to finally go to sleep.

I finish kindergarten and its a little under a month till my birthday, I asked my "mother" if I could call my dad before my birthday and she just ignores me and turns her T.V. up louder. She either ignores me or gets on to me for asking about my father. She's got some new boyfriend that was in the marines or whatever. She tells me I need to forget abut that man and that "Ryan" would be my new dad. Ryan's not that bad of a guy I guess but he's not my father, he doesn't really talk to me very much. He and my aunt are the only ones that don't hit or kick me. I don't think they really know about it either, when it happens they're not around most of the time.

My aunt did however get onto my brother for always kicking me out of my room, especially when it's time for me to go to bed. So now my brother usually spends his time away from the house so I don't have to see him very much. I guess he goes to his friend's house or to his girlfriend's house. Well except the when he can't use the car. It's a couple weeks before my b-day, and my brother wants spar with me. He burrowed a pair of boxing gloves from some friend of his. We've been on better terms at this point so I didn't think any more of it, it sounded like fun.

He's showing me how to box, I'm throwing a few punches at him and it doesn't seem to phase or bother him and he's making jokes about how weak I am. That got me a little bit pissed so I surprised him when I stopped punching at his gloves; I was punching into his hands, and threw one at his nose. It took him a minute or two to shake it off. I smirked at him and joked back with him, "How weak was that punch?"  
He looks pretty pissed off now and then he decides that I was ready to learn how to block punches.

He tells me to hold my hands up in front of my face and push them together with all my strength to block the punches. He said he would be easy. He throws a couple jabs and it's a little difficult to keep my hands together. My arms are getting tired from blocking and it doesn't help that he keeps punching harder. I asked him to stop and that I had enough, and as I lowered my arms all I could see was red enveloping my vision, I feel my nose crinkling and that's when all thought stopped.

I don't remember being unconscious, I could see the floor and the room with my brother over me checking to see if I was ok but there were bright purple-ish orbs in front of my eyes. He's saying something but I can't make it out, all I can hear is throbbing on both sides of my ears, it's like a dull pounding sound. I remember touching my nose and seeing blood pooling in my hand. Seeing that sent me in a daze, my brother got up to get my aunt, the only other one home, and they take me to the hospital to get checked out. My nose wasn't broken, but we don't have medical insurance. We were billed for a visit to the emergency room.

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My "mother" wasn't too happy with us; she made brother pay for the bill which automatically put me on his shit list. I was grounded for a month, and my birthday party was cancelled. I didn't understand why I was in so much trouble. Sure I shouldn't have hit him on the nose, but he wasn't really hurt from it. I mean did I really have to miss my birthday because of this? Brother blamed me for the incident, and he only made it harder on me after "mother" made him pay for the medical bills and for the blood stain on our bedroom carpet.

My birthday came and went; I didn't get to spend it with my best friend "Mike" from down the street, or any family. I didn't get to do anything; I didn't even get a cake. The present my "mother" got me was new school clothes. I guess it's better than no clothes. That was all I got, I didn't get to call my dad, or go out to eat for my birthday.

Brother did all he could to either ignore me or make sure I stayed out of his way. He was supposed to drive me to school every morning, but he would often leave me to walk to school by myself. If I got in his way he would shove me or knock me down and kept walking, at least he didn't hit me.


End file.
